1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to a system, a walking assistance robot, and a method for assisting a smooth start of a user's action after standing up from a chair.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the birthrates have been declining and the population has been aging in developed countries in late years, the need for watching elderly people and assisting their lives has been increasing. In particular, as a tendency, it is difficult for elderly people to keep QOL (Quality of Life) in living at home because of a decline in their physical performance that occurs with aging. In order to prevent sarcopenia and similar conditions in elderly people and keep their physical performances, it is important for them to keep on exercising at a certain level or more to keep their muscle masses. However, for the elderly people who tend to spend their time at home because the decline in their physical performance prevents them from going out, it is difficult to keep a necessary amount of exercise, resulting in more decrease in their muscle masses, and this becomes vicious cycles.
In late years, in the background described above, there have been proposed various apparatuses which assist a standing-up action from a chair, which is a starting point of living activities.
For example, as for standing-up action assistance robot disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2012-200409, a supporting portion of the robot follows the movement of the user's chest to assist a standing-up action of the user sitting on a chair.
Meanwhile, for example, a dental chair disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2011-10874 assists the patient's standing-up action by raising obliquely upward the pad portions that support the patient's elbows in synchronization with a rise of the seat.